


Multi-Purpose Business Cards

by nawsies



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Allura and Shiro are mentioned, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Fluff, Gender-Neutral Pronouns for Pidge | Katie Holt, M/M, Mutual Pining, Pre-Relationship, dumb boys being dumb and in love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-26
Updated: 2016-12-26
Packaged: 2018-09-12 11:14:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9069139
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nawsies/pseuds/nawsies
Summary: Lance's business cards may not have been his brightest idea but, they do have a 100% success rate so who is Pidge to judge? 
AKA another coffeeshop AU; featuring sassy Pidge, not enough Hunk and Keith and Lance being awkward about their feelings.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is a Voltron Secret Santa gift for [Jordan](http://whalechief.tumblr.com) and I really hope they like it!

“I finally did it!” said Lance as he pushed open the door to the café with a flourish. He marched behind the counter and stopped by Pidge, arms outspread waiting for some kind of reaction.

“It’d be nice if one of these days that meant you finally made it on time,” Pidge drawled from where they were leaned over beside the register flicking through a magazine.

Lance rolled his eyes as he tucked his stuff into the cupboard at Pidge’s feet. “Look, we’re not even open yet, I don’t see why I should disrupt my beauty sleep to hang around in an empty café.”

“Well you could, you know, do your jobs? Help Hunk with food prep? Make sure the grinder is full of beans? Make sure all the cups are clean because I don’t feel like it?” Pidge fluttered their eyelashes at Lance with a grin, the expression dropping immediately as they turned back to their magazine.

“I don’t need any help! Keep Lance away from my food!” yelled Hunk, his head poking through the door that separated the service area from the kitchen. He pointed at each of them with his wooden spoon and then disappeared. The kitchen was his domain, long may he reign because he was a god in there, and although they offered (or threatened) to invade, no one went in there without express permission.

“Look, Hunk doesn’t even need my help and whether or not the cups are clean isn’t my fault, that’s on the night staffs shoddy cleaning skills.” Lance finished tying his apron on and despite his complaints started checking the cups on top the coffee machine. “Dude, you haven’t even turned this on what the heck? And seriously, does no one care about what I did?”

“Not really,” Pidge shrugged.

“I just came here to work and honestly I am feeling so attacked right now.” Lance feigned hurt as he set about getting the espresso machine up and running.

“You work in customer service, you were always going to be attacked at some point today. Just be glad it’s with friendly words and not with hot coffee.”

“Not much friendly about you Gremlin.”

“I resemble that comment.” Pidge winked over the top of their glasses.

“OK! That’s the last of the croissants done, should keep the savages happy. What did you finally do Lance?” Hunk leaned in the doorway dusting off flour on his apron and looking between Pidge and Lance expectantly. 

“I made business cards!” Lance exclaimed, he put the cup he was inspecting back in the pile and pulled out a small stack of cards from the pocket in his jeans and flicked one to Hunk like it was a frisbee.

“Dancer, Lover, Man of your Dreams,” Hunk read aloud. “Nice job on the ‘dancer’ Lance, keeping it professional.”

“I am nothing if not classy, and the minimum you could get made was 250 so I thought they should be multi-purpose.” Lance took the card back and shoved it in his back pocket with the rest of them.

“What’s the point of printing 250 business cards that say ‘lover’ on them when you’re madly in love with Chemistry Keith?” Pidge asked, flipping their magazine shut and spinning on their stool to face Hunk and Lance. Lance was spluttering at the mention of Keith, his blush already rising on his cheeks, he made teasing him far too easy. “And you’re going to give business cards that say ‘Lover’ on them to potential employers? I know I’m young and new to the workplace game but, really?”

“No, I’m not stupid!” Lance rolled his eyes, conveniently ignoring the mention of Keith, and held up a business card. “See the slashes between the options, I’m just going to cross out whatever isn’t relevant, multi-purpose, ingenious, no one has ever done this before.”

“Do dancers need business cards?” Hunk mused, his question lost as Pidge and Lance’s discussion scaled into a full-fledged argument about the merits and downfalls of multi-purpose business cards.

It was a discussion that unfortunately got brought up again and again throughout the morning. Even once they opened there was still time to raise another pro or con and debate their merits. Business was slow, the clock ticking could be heard over the music that Pidge had playing through the speakers. Any customers that came left as soon as their coffee was ready, take-away cups were the order of most mornings, people had places to be, people to see, and sitting in an empty café at 8am sounded more like a nightmare than a dream to a lot of people. Lance couldn’t blame them, working in an empty café at 8am was more of a nightmare than a dream.

On the bright side, when it was quiet like this Lance had the time and freedom to sit back on the counter by the register and chat with his two best buds. If Allura saw him sitting there she’d flip out which was unreasonable; it was fine when she fed mice behind the kitchen like she was in Ratatouille but he sits on one counter and all hell breaks loose? The injustice of it all. Thankfully since Hunk had been promoted to supervisor Lance could sit freely, the world was at peace. He should probably thank Shiro for that, since he’s the one who told Allura she was working too hard but he was also kind of to blame since he went off to work on some organic farm in New Zealand and left them all to suffer Allura’s lonely wrath.  

 Pidge sat bolt upright in the midst of Lance gushing about the new seaweed face mask he had been trying out and they turned to him, their eyes shining. “Have you ever noticed that ballerina tutus look like UFOs?” They asked, they sounded absolutely delighted by the revelation.

“No,” Lance gasped, “but now that I’ve been enlightened I’m going to dedicate an entire routine to space,” Lance threw his arms out and shimmied his hands in the air. “I’m going to choreograph it to Queen Gaga’s Dance in the Dark, no one but me will know it’s not about being self-conscious, it’s about wanting to be abducted by aliens.”

Pidge mimed wiping away a tear. “You’re the greatest mind of our age.”

“I find that hard to believe,” said Keith, startling Lance who jumped off the counter and spun so quickly he lost balance. Keith, thankfully, didn’t notice his mistake as he was focussed entirely on the menu which gave Lance ample time to appreciate the view. Keith had wrapped his red leather jacket round his waist over ripped black jeans. How he managed to pull that off was a mystery to Lance. He was tapping his combat boots against the floor as he considered his decisions, he had sucked his lip between his teeth and was gnawing it absent-mindedly.

 “Keith! My man, my buddy, my rag time guy, what can I do you for? For you?” Lance said, trying to ignore his rambling, the places where his words tripped over each other in their rush to get out. Keith had that effect on him most days but when he tied his hair up like that it was just a bizarre form of punishment.

 Keith seemed not to have noticed, as engrossed as he was in the menu, which Lance thought was a ridiculous charade since he always ordered the same drink and so, really, what was the point? (Pidge would be all too happy to point out how many times Keith looked back down at Lance from the menu, or the colour that dusted his cheeks when Lance smiled, or the time he spent sitting at his usual table staring at Lance, violet eyes usually eerie and cold becoming tender and kind.)

“Let me guess, a long black with a dash of almond milk?” Lance was already at the espresso machine, locking in a basket full of ground coffee as he plucked a mug from the pile.

“The largest you can make,” sighed Keith, settling into his chair at the table nearest the counter. When it was quiet like this he took the time to chat to them all, asking Lance questions about upcoming assignments and what courses he was planning on taking next semester. Hunk was always welcoming, taking a break from his seemingly never ending kitchen work to come sit with him, for which Keith was grateful. Pidge, of course, always had some conspiracy or gadget or other nerdy thing discuss with him in great detail.

“Of course,” said Lance, feigning offence, “What kind of idiot do you take me for?”

“Good, just making sure.” Keith said, biting his lip again and nodding.

“He’s far too kind. I mean, you’re the kind of idiot who thinks the Loch Ness monster isn’t real, which is truly unforgiveable,” said Pidge. They just had to bring that up again, one time Lance voices an opinion on some random myth and it haunts him forever.

“It’s not that I don’t think they’re real, I just think that it’s improbable. I mean, what would she even eat?” Lance asked as he double-checked it was almond milk he had just poured into Keith’s coffee. “Haggis?”

“Non-believers,” Pidge deadpanned.

Lance rolled his eyes, giving Pidge a small shove as he went past with Keith’s coffee. When he placed it down at Keith’s table he was rewarded with the smallest, sweetest of smiles and he was glad he’d got the coffee on the table without spilling it with the way his hands shook. Some days Keith was around Lance functioned like a normal human being capable of full bodily functions, other days, he was this.

“Here’s your coffee and,” in a fit of bravery he’d later blame on complete breakdown of neural function Lance pulled out a business card, “here’s my card. I love you.”

“What?” Keith’s brow furrowed and he tilted his head to the side reminding Lance of a confused cat.

“I said I hope you don’t choke, take the damn card,” Lance dropped the card on the table and all but ran back behind the counter. Hunk and Pidge were howling with laughter in the kitchen doorway, both folded over double, shoulders shaking, clinging to each other for stability.

“You both suck,” Lance hissed.

“That was smooth Lance, real smooth,” Hunk choked out through fits of laughter. How Keith was just sitting calmly through the chaos was anybody’s guess.

Lance pressed his face into the crook of Hunk’s neck and let him pat his back. He twisted his face to the side and pouted at Pidge, who was still laughing far too much. He should have known there’d be no sympathy to find there.

“What do I do now?” Lance whined. “I told him I loved him! Who does that!?”

“You know what your guitar teacher always says, about if you make a mistake just keep going so that it seems natural? Do that.” Hunk said. He stepped away from Lance and placed his hands on his shoulders to pull him upright. “I don’t think he even heard you anyway, you got this tiger. Just be glad you gave him your card! You did great.”

“Thanks buddy.” Lance said. He drifted over the coffee machine and started whipping himself up a comfort hot chocolate, perks of the job and all.

He took the stool Pidge had been using for most the morning and sipped at his hot chocolate, it was sickly sweet and perfect. Pidge and Hunk were kind enough to take care of the few customers who came and went while he was out of commission. His impromptu break was interrupted when Keith came up to him holding up his card looking perplexed. Maybe Pidge was right and multi-purpose business cards weren’t a great idea. Especially when he forgot to cross out the alternate options.

“Um this might be a dumb question but, this isn’t just you showing me your dumb cards right?” Keith asked unable to look at Lance as he spoke.  “This is actually you giving me your number?”

Lance blinked a few times. His face was uncharacteristically pale. With his left hand he picked at the frayed edge of his apron, only frayed because of how often he messed with it. “Oh, um, yeah, that was, I was giving you the number- no not that, my number.” He stopped and bowed his head, taking a deep breath. When he looked up he found Keith smiling at him, corners of his eyes crinkling like the cracks in his stupid leather jacket. “Yeah, I was giving you my number.”

“Cool that’s, cool.” Keith said. He kicked at the floor, biting his lip to try stifle the embarrassing smile that he’d been wearing.

Lance stood up and leaned his face closer to Keith’s over the counter. “So…that’s a good reaction right? You wanted my number?”

“Well yeah, of course.”

“See it worked!” Lance jerked back, gripping the edge of the counter and yelling at Pidge. The colour had returned to his face and despite the whiplash Keith was getting from the mood change, he was glad to see him back to normal.  

“What worked?” Pidge asked.

“Multi-purpose business cards are fool-proof, 100% success rate.” Lance cheered.  

“But you didn’t even remember to cross out the other options!” Pidge said throwing her hands up in the air. “The only reason it worked is because Keith is a lovesick fool too!” Pidge’s protests fell on deaf ears. Keith looked like he considered being vaguely offended but ended up just shrugging, Pidge was disgusted.

“Ignoring the love-repulsed gremlin,” Lance turned back to Keith and plucked the card from his hands, using a pen to draw hearts around his number and then scrawl his address on the back. “Do you want to go out this Friday? We can meet at my place, there’s going to be this cool Christmas night market nearby, I’m sure I could find you some gloves with actual fingers on them.” Lance rubbed the back of his neck, holding the card out with his other hand and grinning sheepishly at Keith.

“What’s wrong with my fingerless gloves?” Keith said. He took the card and, staring more at his gloves than at Lance. Not that Lance was complaining, his heart was racing a million miles a minute and if Keith looked at him with those soft eyes and that overwhelming joy he was going to ascend to the heavens. Someone would have to call his parents to say he wouldn’t make it home for Christmas because he’d died at work, not in some bizarre coffee related accident just his love-struck heart failing him because of a cute boy’s eye contact.

“Nothing, I’m just worried about you getting frostbite when the cold hits.” Lance teased. “Which would suck because I’m kind of excited about holding your hand and I don’t need you losing your fingers before I get the chance.”

“How long do you think it’s going to take us before we hold hands?” Keith seemed to be seriously considering the question and Lance couldn’t deny the warmth that rose in his chest at just how much effort Keith was putting in before they were even anything real.  

“Oh at least three months, after meeting each other’s parents, and probably some lessons with a Priest…I’m kidding holy shit you look terrified, are you afraid of priests?”

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Holidays!   
> You can find me over at [tumblr](http://dreamsofbooksandmonsters.tumblr.com)   
> The best holiday present you could give me is comments/kudos! :)


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